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Raid Rx: Tagging out and tagging in healers
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poohbah of World of Matticus and a founder of Plus Heal, a discussion community for healers of all experience levels and interests. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading, the Matticast. Ever had to swap a healer in the middle of a raid? Maybe he requested it. Maybe he's experiencing connection-related problems. The most common reason I can think of is because he's not able to handle his position well at all. I'm also guessing you tried to switch healer assignments in case he kept striking out. Clearly that didn't work, because you're in the process of bringing in a new player to replace him. When doing this, you need to talk to the player twice: once to signal his stepping out, and then once again after the raid for a diagnostic on what he messed up on.
Raid Rx: The power of audio cues
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poohbah of World of Matticus and a founder of Plus Heal, a discussion community for healers of all experience levels and interests. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading, the Matticast. I have a hypothesis I'd like to share, and I'd love to hear your take about this in the comments. Healers react better to sound as opposed to visual cues on the screen. We should embrace this. Now, this isn't to say we need to clutter Mumble with various players calling out different abilities. There are a few addons out there (such as GTFO) that make use of sound indicators whenever you're standing in something you shouldn't be standing in. Healers have a heavy responsibility to: Oversee the raid. Watch the ground they're standing on. Remove or mitigate boss buffs or debuffs. Constantly range check their healing assignments (like tanks). Gauge the timing of mechanics or phases. Used cooldowns (depending who you are). I'd like to think most of us can handle that simply by staring at the screen. With the assortment of timers and other visual addons, we're exposed to a plethora of information used to feed us information. The sad part is that it can be extremely overwhelming, to the point that we don't know what to do next. That split-second decision could be the wrong move because we reacted to something that wasn't as important. For example, I may have cast Prayer of Healing on the group, but I would not have done that if I had realized earlier that the boss did his super move, causing a death to a tank or another player.
Raid Rx: The value of the all-purpose healer
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poohbah of World of Matticus and a founder of Plus Heal, a discussion community for healers of all experience levels and interests. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading, the Matticast. When it comes to setting up healing in raids, we like to lump healers into different specializations. We have players who strictly tank heal or raid heal. In some cases, there is a specific role they need to play within the encounter (like kite healing). Blizzard has done a great job of trying to equalize the healing classes to the point that they can do everything competently. Even then, we continue to instinctively place the different classes into specific healing roles. If you are a healer who has traditionally done only one type of healing, then it is time to diversify.
Raid Rx: Guide to healing Alysrazor
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poohbah of World of Matticus and a founder of Plus Heal, a discussion community for healers of all experience levels and interests. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading, the Matticast. Up for a really big bird? Maybe a little BBQ bird? Although more of dragon than anything, Alysrazor does sort of look like a bird. This fight isn't really as challenging as Baleroc, but it does have a fair share of obstacles. You'd better be able to heal on the move, as this encounter will throw a ton of stuff your way when you least expect it. Know where your tanks are at all times, because if the monsters they're tanking become really angry and throw a tantrum, you'll need to step up and keep them alive. If you have a basic understanding of the encounter, keep reading. You may wish to refer to the encounter journal or other resources to get the whole picture of what is going on and what the different roles are.
Raid Rx: Healer's guide to Baleroc
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand pooh-bah of World of Matticus and a founder of Plus Heal, a discussion community for healers of all experience levels and interests. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading, the Matticast. This Baleroc encounter gave me a big fit both on the healing management side and the micromanagement side. It is entirely about the healers and their ability to switch assignments on command. Peripheral vision plays a huge role, so make sure your camera angles aren't too far out, or else you'll miss the crystal spawns. Stay too close, and you'll be blasted with a debuff that will cause your healing ability to plummet and almost assuredly lead to a tank death. After successfully healing with both the one-tank method and the two-tank method, I prefer the two-tank method. My thoughts and the methods laid out reflect my raid group in a 25-player setting.
Raid Rx: Lord Rhyolith and Beth'tilac healing impressions
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of Plus Heal, a discussion community for healers of all experience levels and interests. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. Firelands is here! Yay! The other night, my raid took down entry bosses Beth'tilac and Lord Rhyolith. Both have their share of intensive healing phases. This week, I'll walk you through a little bit of the threats involved and approach the two encounters from the mindset of both a healing leader and a healer. I'll let you know when to save and when to use your cooldowns. How much have the encounters changed since the last time I faced them on the PTR? I have to say not much, since the mechanics and damage are about the same. To be fair, when I tried them out on the PTR, it was done with a 10-player group. I found the live version 25-man to be much more forgiving at times, despite the high output of damage.
Raid Rx: Answering the raid composition question
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of Plus Heal, a discussion community for healers of all experience levels and interests. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. I received an email from a player who had a few questions about raid composition. When and how much does a raid's healing class composition matter? Is there still a distinction between raid and tank healers? I'm a holy paladin with a secure spot in a ten-man raiding team. I have noticed my raid leader bending over backwards to avoid bringing a second healing paladin along. In fact, they tried hard to avoid bringing two of any healing class. The raid leader would rather search trade for pickup players than bring a second player of the same class from the guild. In your opinion, is this attitude justified or is it a relic of the wrath era? I feel bad boxing out certain players from the main raid team, even on nights when we're one or two healers short. To provide context, we can take out most of the normal mode bosses on a good week. We'll most likely transition to Firelands instead of present raiding heroics when the time comes. Thanks, DG Alright DG, let's break this down and go over the different pros and cons in enforcing class compositions.
Raid Rx: Auditing the healing team
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of Plus Heal, a discussion community for healers of all experience levels and interests. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. As we get into the next tier coming with patch 4.2, the time has come for healers to take a hard look at themselves and each other. This is a great time for healing leaders to examine the strengths and weaknesses of their healing group and see what needs to be shored up. Some of the questions to ask yourselves have been inspired by a discussion I participated in. They were excellent questions, and I wanted to expand on them and share my thoughts because I know there are other healers who are undoubtedly thinking the same thing about themselves and others.
Raid Rx: Preparing for Firelands
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. Now that we sort of have a release date for patch 4.2, the time has come to review everything healers should be aware of in anticipation. The gear "floor" is going to reset. This means you'll now purchase tier 11 items with justice points, so you'll have a chance to step into the new raids without having such a large gear deficiency. The valor vendor now has some new swag available for purchase. Your existing valor emblems will convert to justice points, so you may want to consider planning your item purchases around it (at least, if you still need to). Still worried about the gear gap? Don't worry, as the Avengers of Hyjal have some new faction items you can buy to help in your efforts against Ragnaros and his minions. Certain items that are picked up from the vendor or from raid trash can be upgraded to heroic item levels. At the end of the post, I'm going to list my thoughts on healing in tier 11, and I'd like to hear what you've thought of it.
Raid Rx: Adapting to healer deaths without combat resurrection
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. Just a quick heads up for healers: If you haven't visited Plus Heal in a while, do check it out, as it has undergone a facelift. If you've registered there in the past, you'll need to re-register, because user information was not able to be transferred. On to this week's post. This is a classic case study for healing leaders and handling player deaths -- healer deaths, to be specific. In this case, I goofed up big time. We were tackling the heroic version of Atramedes. There are two ways that this encounter can be done: Option 1: Move everyone together as a single unit. Option 2: Split the raid in half and assault Atramedes on both sides. We went for the second option. I split the healers up, four in one direction and three in the other. Somehow I ended up with three priests on one side and a mix of shaman, druids and paladins on the other. I wasn't thinking properly; for Leap of Faith reasons, I wanted at least two priests on that one side. So what else happened?
Raid Rx: How to combine Spirit Link Totem and Power Word: Barrier
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. I envy shaman. A latest look at the front page of World of Logs shows that the new shaman totem of awesomeness (Spirit Link Totem) has a rather intriguing property to it. We've had it for a while now, ever since patch 4.1, and this totem is the new shaman defensive mechanic. Anyone standing within 10 yards of it reduces incoming damage by 10%. Cool. What else? Every second, the health of all the players standing within it also gets redistributed. The interesting part is that the health can be increased to count as healing. However, that sword swings both ways. It'll also adjust health downward, which counts as damage. Even better? This damage can be both resisted and mitigated.
Raid Rx: How to prioritize combat resurrections
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. Before I get into anything today, I've been getting a few emails from people all asking various forms of this question: "How can I convince my guild leader that I should get Dragonwrath, Tarecgosa's Rest?" Look, as much as I love legendary weapons, that's not a healer weapon. It's coming with patch 4.2. Don't even think about making a play for it. Its benefits are maximized for your guild as a whole if it gets awarded to a DPS player. Even then, if you're not sure if there's anyone in the guild who does deserve it, you still have a few months before it can even be completed, anyway, due to all the stuff that's required for construction. Scott Andrews wrote a brilliant piece for leaders who are deciding who gets Dragonwrath. Even though I joked about it a little bit in the comments, it's not for Smite priests, either. Dragonwrath is not a healer weapon. Do not give your guild leader a headache by trying to insist it is. As much as I'd like to spend the entire column copying and pasting the previous statement, I can't. We've got death knights who can bring up dead players now -- and not just in ghoul form. It's time to sort things out: What's the priority order?
Raid Rx: Healing changes and Firelands thoughts
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. Here's one of the larger healing changes coming up in patch 4.2. It'll affect all healers for sure, since it affects the critical strike of heals. We first learned Blizzard was contemplating this change several weeks ago in a Dev Watercooler post. All healing critical strikes now heal for 2 times a normal heal (+100%), up from 1.5 times a normal heal (+50%). source I'll go over my thoughts about the proposed healing changes for patch 4.2. I also had the opportunity to try out some of the new raid encounters on the PTR in Firelands. Think you're ready for the upcoming healing challenge?
Raid Rx: Analyzing tier 12 healing set bonuses
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. Good news, everyone! Patch 4.2 information is heating up! I've already fired up my PTR client, and I'll be eagerly testing any new encounters. Some of the new information that has been released includes the new tier bonuses, which I'm sure you're burning with desire to know more about. I'll see if I can help stoke the flames of your anticipation. I suspect we'll have some players returning to see if new content is going to rekindle their interest in the game. Too many fire puns? Okay, let's just blaze on through and look at healing tier bonuses.
Raid Rx: Pick the best moments for Rallying Cry
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. 4.1's out! I've been busy killing trolls in Zul'Aman and Zul'Gurub, grabbing healing loot for my alts. I wasn't able to get a chance to explore the new healing synergies with all the new healer abilities and Rallying Cry. Warriors have that new ability which temporarily grants 20% maximum health to members in your party or raid for 10 seconds before the health fades away. Like it or not, warriors are now a part of the arsenal that healing leaders have. Also, a nifty trick includes combining both Rallying Cry and Last Stand that leads to mega-health for your tank. Doing this requires two warriors. From what I can see, Rallying Cry needs to be used first, before Last Stand, to maximize benefits. Get your tanking warrior to use Enraged Regeneration, and that'll just about outheal anything most healers can do. Get used to adding Rallying Cry to your skills. Warriors, please remind your leaders that you have it available. Now, on what fights would your warriors be doing their whole yelling thing? I've got several in mind.
Raid Rx: Healing loot from Zul'Aman and Zul'Gurub in patch 4.1
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. Looking to bridge the gap between heroic dungeons and raids? The new item drops from the updated Zul'Aman and Zul'Gurub ought to help with that! Obviously, these items aren't meant to be the best items in this tier, but if you want to reach for the gear ceiling in preparation for patch 4.2, you'd best have an idea of what the trolls are keeping away from you. For me, the big ticket items are things like rings, wands, off hands, bracers and select weapons. I know the places look the same, but other than looks, the encounters have been updated. I'm psyched to tackle trolls again. It has been a while since we had trolls to sink our weapons in. After the jump, we'll examine all the items available.
Raid Rx: Throughput, regeneration and secondary stats
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Catch his weekly podcast on healing, raiding and leading on the Matticast. This ends up being the same question that new players keep asking that has spanned multiple expansions. The war between throughput and regeneration continues to be debated. Really, though, there isn't much to discuss because you can't really compare the two on the same scale. Throughput refers to the strength and impact your spells make. Intellect, critical strike rating, mastery and haste affect that to some degree, depending on your class. Regeneration is largely about your mana pool and the rate at which you gain mana back. Without mana, no spells can be cast. Intellect and spirit are the main stats here. They both affect different parts of your game, and I hesitate whenever I'm asked to pit the two against each other.
Raid Rx: How to determine healing spell priorities
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Following up from last week's piece on when to wipe, I want to take a closer look at healing priority in Cataclysm. Last year, I wrote an article discussing the different factors to consider when choosing your healing targets. I guess the question to ask is: Have things changed since then? Here are all the factors to consider: Inbound heals Cooldowns used Imminent damage Key players Accessibility There are bound to be others, but that's the main idea. Target priority hasn't changed much in Cataclysm. The question I continue to receive is what a player should actually do in terms of spell use. Let's do some healing analysis, and I'll walk you through what I do. Just do keep in mind that healing can have multiple right answers. Figure out what works for you and is effective for your raid group.
Raid Rx: When is a wipe a wipe?
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Seen the new Holy Word: Sanctuary spell graphic yet? That's what it'll look like, in the screenshot above, after patch 4.1. We're going to talk about panicking today. It is a common occurrence among healers, especially during raids. I have been known to lose my cool. But there are different types of panicking, and it helps to recognize them so that you are both aware of it and how you can best react to it. First, some additional healing changes and additions have been announced. Upcoming healing changes in patch 4.1 Druid Nature's Swiftness now also increases the healing done by the affected nature spell by 50%. Priest Holy Word: Sanctuary healing done has been increased by 35%. Shaman Cleansing Waters now has a 6-second internal cooldown. source My thoughts after the jump.
Raid Rx: Best practices for healing heroic Chimaeron
Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. Next big test on the raid list after taking down heroic Halfus is the heroic multi-face boss (commonly referred to as Chimaeron) in Blackwing Descent. No, Chimaeron isn't the dragons that are pictured above (although they're all in the same place). I haven't been able to get him down yet, since he is one tough dude. The reason why I've found Chimaeron more challenging than Halfus is because the Halfus encounter is over in a minute, if your raid can survive the initial rush. In Chimaeron, the healers are working overtime. We've been able to consistently get him down to the final phase. I imagine we're not the only ones who are still struggling with him (or it).
